Attitude has a big impact

Attitude matters.
A quick search of the Internet brings up a laundry list of quotes regarding attitude from some of history’s most famous thinkers. Winston Churchill, Albert Einstein and Thomas Jefferson are all on the list.
There’s even a book entitled “Attitude is Everything.”
In the past few weeks, the Jay County and Fort Recovery high school football teams have learned just what a big difference attitude can make.
In their season opener, the Indians struggled in the opening half. They fumbled six times before the intermission and trailed by two touchdowns.
But coach Brent Niekamp didn’t see any heads down in the locker room.
“There wasn’t an ounce of panic,” he said. “There really wasn’t. Everybody understood that we could do this if we just did what we needed to do and execute and believe in it. … There was never really a down moment on the sideline.”
The Indians rallied back, scoring three times in the final nine minutes with the winning points coming on a Jackson Hobbs field goal with just two seconds remaining.
Jay County had a demoralizing final two minutes of the first half in its opening game against Delta. The Patriots, coach Tim Millspaugh said, didn’t respond very well to the adversity.
So when they went into the locker room down 7-0 to Wallaceburg on Friday night, he was determined not to allow the same pattern to occur again.
“We didn’t feel like we handled (Delta) very well and that was disappointing,” he said. “So when we got (in the locker room) … we talked about mental toughness.
“We just kind of challenged those kids. They have to respond, they have to continue to battle and compete …”
They did.
The Patriots closed the gap to 7-6 in the third quarter, and a Toby McCallister interception in the fourth led to a game-winning touchdown run by Sean Winget.
Admittedly, it’s easier to talk about positive attitudes when the result is a comeback victory. But it doesn’t make the comments from Niekamp and Millspaugh any less true.
Attitude matters.
In more than 12 years covering games for The Commercial Review, I’ve seen teams that were beaten before they even took the floor. They knew they were going to lose, either because they had always lost to the opponent they were facing or because of a wide disparity in record. The body language said everything, even before the first play was called or the first shot taken.
Had those teams come in with a different mindset they may well have lost anyway, because attitude isn’t everything. Talent matters. So does coaching. And, like it or not, luck often comes into play.
But a positive attitude can definitely help.[[In-content Ad]]